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| CRAZY BLOCK MADE INTO A PILLOW |
As I stepped into the Berea Appalachian Fireside Gallery this past August, I was met with a small exhibit of contemporary crazy quilt blocks. The blocks were artistic, diverse, colorful, and had particularly fine needlework. There was a sign near the quilt blocks that introduced the exhibit as "Out On The Line IV." The artists of the blocks were women from a group called The Berea Depot Quilters.
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| BLOCK MADE INTO A DISPLAY PIECE |
The sign's information also stated that the blocks were made using the round robin method. I was totally unfamiliar with round robin. I contacted the quilt group and talked to Carol Ann White about the the method. Basically it is a few quilters working on crazy quilt blocks.
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| A BLOCK IN THE MAKING |
Above is an example of a block that is just beginning to be worked on. You can say it is pretty much in its raw state. As you can see the block has ten crazy quilt pieces. This means that ten quilters will be involved with working on this particular block. Each crazy quilt piece of the ten pieces of each block will be assigned to one quilter who will add her unique needlework during the round robin.
Each quilter will have a block of ten crazy pieces to be passed around simultaneously to all ten quilters -- each quilter getting only one of the blocks at a time.
As each quilter has the block for a month it will take ten months for each of the quilter's blocks to be finished. Each of the ten blocks will contain a collage of all the persons involved with this particular round robin.
Hope this explanation is understandable -- please send me a comment with any questions about how to do this round robin.
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| LION DETAIL ON A FINISHED BLOCK |
The lion block above displays some of the work accomplished on one of the blocks. Below are some of the individual blocks that were in the exhibit.
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| CRAZY QUILT STYLE ON A FINISHED BLOCK |
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| WEB AND SPIDER SURROUNDED BY OTHER DESIGNS |
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| MIX OF VIBRANT COLORS AMONGST THE CRAZY QUILT PIECES |
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| A DELICATE ICE CREAM CONE SURROUNDED BY LACE |
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| GARDEN VARIETY OF CRAZY PIECES |
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| BEE, BUTTERFLY AND FLOWER PIECES |
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| LACE, 2009 DATE, AND A PORCUPINE |
I felt the quilt blocks were both eye-catching and striking -- certainly a reflection of the quilter's love of their craft.
The quilters involved were: Rita Barlow, Pat Jennings. Linda Murdoch, Deannee Oliver, Barbara Taylor, Sarah Vaughn, Ginnifer Watts, Carol Ann White, and Jo Ann White.
